Saturday, January 10, 2015

Quote for Day: Should Our Highest Value Be Free Speech or Love, Kindness, Generosity, and Respect for Others?

Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of Tikkun, on the way in which the media are treating free speech as an absolute value, and the highest in the canon of values, in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo murders, while the structural violence that inflicts suffering on millions of people to enrich a few goes totally unnoticed by the media:

"And shouldn't free speech and individual human liberties be our highest value? This value that is put into danger if you ask for some kind of responsibility from comedians." Two responses: 1. No, individaul human liberties is not our highest value. Our highest value is treating human beings with love, kindness, generosity, respect and see them as embodiments of the holy, and treating the earth as sacred. Individual liberty is a strategy to promote this highest value, but when that liberty gets abused (as for example in demeaning women, African Americans, gays in public discourse) we often insist that the articulators of racism, sexism and homophobia be publicly humiliated (not shut down, but using our free speech to vigorously challenge theirs). 2. Free speech is not defeated when we use it to try to marginalize hateful or demeaning speech. So lets call demeaning speech, including demeaning humor, what it really is -- an assault on the dignity of human beings.

None of this is reason to stop mourning the horrific murders in Paris or to excuse it in any way. But it is reason to wonder why the media can never tell a more nuanced story of what is happening our world.

To which I say a hearty Amen.

(Thanks to Jim McCrea for sharing this article with his email circle.)

"We need, in every community, a group of angelic troublemakers." Bayard Rustin, Quaker gay activist

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I'm a theologian who writes about the interplay of belief and culture. My husband Steve (also a theologian) and I are now in our 47th year together. Though the church has discarded us (and here, here, here, and here) because we insist on being truthful about our shared life, we continue to celebrate the amazing grace we find in our journey together and love for each other.
We live in hope; we remain on pilgrimage....
A note about my educational background: I have a Ph.D. and M.A. in theology from Univ. of St. Michael's College, Toronto School of Theology; an M.A. in English from Tulane Univ.; and a B.A. in English from Loyola, New Orleans.